|
From the introduction. The central figure of the Castle - we know him only as K. - is a land surveyor who never gets a chance to do any surveying. His job is to measure and estimate, which in the Kafka economy suggests that he should be taken as a seeker, a man embarked on a quest for meaning. He comes to the Castle, that clouded locus of authority, not 'to lead an honored and comfortable life', but in order to gain acceptance by the higher, perhaps celestial powers and thereby to discover 'the reason of things'. In a revealing passage that Kafka deleted, perhaps because it is too revealing, K. says: 'I have a difficult task ahead of me and have dedicated my whole life to it...Because it is all I have - that task, I mean - I ruthlessly suppress everything that might disturb me to carry it out...'
|
